Ella McCay
review by Bobby Blakey
Director James L. Brooks has a strong resume including Broadcast News, Terms of Endearment, As Good As It Gets and Spanglish. Now after almost 15 years he has returned to the director’s chair for his latest film Ella McCay starring Emma Mackey, Jamie Lee Curtis, Jack Lowden, Kumail Nanjiani, Ayo Edebiri, Spike Fearn, Rebecca Hall, Julie Kavner, Becky Ann Baker, Joey Brooks with Albert Brooks and Woody Harrelson.​ Could this film bring the drama and laughs or should it stay out of office?
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Ella McCay follows an idealistic young woman juggling her less-than-perfect family with her passion for her work. From writer-director James L. Brooks, this fresh and heartwarming comedy is about the people you love and how to survive them.
Without seeing the trailer for this film, I had assumed it was some sort of romantic comedy going in but was clearly something else altogether. It still plays by a lot of the tropes of this type of genre without taking any chances, but it still entertained more than I had expected despite some bumps in the road along the way. I enjoyed the direction of this story, but they interject too many substories to allow it to stay on the track it needs to be.
The main story of Ella’s life is enough of an element that could have carried the film in a completely different direction in dramatic fashion. The highlight of this film for me was her family members of her dad played by Woody Harrelson and aunt played by Jamie Lee Curtis. Harrelson’s character is despicable but is attempted to be used as a comedic element at times which I think was the wrong
choice. He is unredeemable and a complete disaster of a human, thankfully he never gets the redemption it started to feel like they were going to give him.
Curtis steals the show with her blunt but loving aunt Helen. She weaves in and out of the film as both parental figure to Ella as well as sounding board and defender. Every scene she was in I thought elevated the film to something more than it is on the surface. Ella’s struggle through her political career is another plot that could have sustained itself completely with a great performance and likable character played by Kumail Nanjiani. Their limited amount of time together is the bright spot in Ella’s day every time and there could have been something else altogether in how the story works.
Emma Mackey is good in the role bringing the awkwardness, innocence and frustration to the role that is a great character to weave through this story and other characters, but it gets lost pulling her in so many directions. Her side story with her brother feels forced and totally pointless in the bigger story. Had it been a film about every member of the family then it might have worked, but it just doesn’t. Ella’s husband is yet another horrible character in the film that predictably goes down this route of expected betrayal despite being set up as a great character. This was not a surprise and could have been fine had there been more to it, but it just felt sudden and petty to no real necessity or conclusion.
This isn’t a great film, but it is one that I still enjoyed despite its issues thanks to the unexpected direction and nature of the film itself. Maybe my zero expectations play into my enjoyment of the finished product, but I still laughed and was invested in Ella’s journey as generic as it was.
In addition to the film this release offers bonus content including deleted scenes and featurettes taking you behind bringing this film to life. Grab your copy of Ella McCay available now on digital, streaming on Hulu and Blu-ray from 20th Century Studios.